Impact assessment of the Lawrence waste water treatment plant on the Wakarusa River: Follow-up assessment


Start Date: 2020

End Date: 2021

Full Citation:

City of Lawrence, $113,875, 2020–2021. Impact assessment of the Lawrence waste water treatment plant on the Wakarusa River: Follow-up assessment. PI: D. Baker. Co-PI: T. Harris.

Category:

  • Aquatic

Associated with the KU Field Station: No

Research Summary:

This two-year study continues the chemical and biological monitoring of the Wakarusa River that we performed in 2013-2015 prior to the City of Lawrence’s new wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) coming into operation in 2018. That 2013-2015 baseline study fulfilled a pre-discharge monitoring requirement for the discharge permit that the City obtained from the Kansas Department of Environment and Health. The two study sites are located upstream and downstream of the WWTP discharge. To determine if discharge is affecting the Wakarusa River, we repeat the study at the same sites, using the same methods, to compare the downstream site to the upstream site which serves as a control site since the previous study showed no biological or chemical differences between the two sites.

Images:

Debbie Baker measuring water chemistry at the upper Wakarusa River site, 20 May 2020.

Facing upstream at the upper Wakarusa River site, 6 April 2021.

Facing downstream at the lower Wakarusa River site, 6 April 2021.